Description
Aethelred II (978-1016), Penny, small crux type (c.995-997) Dover mint, moneyer Leofwine, inner linear circles both sides, bare headed bust left, in front trefoil tipped sceptre, cutting into drapery, legend surrounds +ÆĐELRÆD REX ANGLOR. Rev, short cross voided with CRUX in angles, reading LEOFPINE M-O DOVE, 1.06g (S.1148; N.770 var). A well struck example of this scarcer type, in a smaller module flan, characteristic peck marks, plain serifless letters and a different portrait to the conventional Crux issue, considerably rare. Near very fine for mint and type.
The vast majority of the smaller module Crux pieces came via the Danegeld hoards and show the archetypal peckmarks. They were struck mainly in London or Kentish mints, (Dolley cites a few rare coins of this type emerging in East Anglia with the true ‘Crux Ca’ features, Exeter and Lincoln mentioned in North, but seldom seen, with the exception of the Louth mint, Lincolnshire unpublished small crux penny which hammered last year for £8,500).
Essentially, they’re restricted to London, Canterbury, Dover and Rochester. For Dover we have the smallest amount of moneyers, only two, Leofwine and Wulfstan (with the exception of Cenric on Dover – via the Igelosa hoard, a single find). Spink auctioned a Dover small Crux (moneyer Wulfstan) in 2012 and classed it as very rare, none others can be found of the mint or type in the last two decades for auction.
cf, BNJ 28 ‘The small crux issue of Aethelred II’ by B. H. I. H. Stewart (1955, Third Series VIII)
